Disability advocates concerned about destruction of WA state records

Julie Gunter was trying to get appropriate services from the Seattle School District for her daughter, a student with disabilities, but hit a major snag: past records of how other school districts handled similar situations were not available – not even in the state archives.

The records Gunter wanted, called Special Education Community Complaint decisions, are commonly used to help argue for better services for students with disabilities.

In 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, and later in 2024, the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction quietly changed its policy for how those documents are stored, allowing even decisions that disability advocates say have precedential value to be deleted after six years.

Rep. Gerry Pollet, D-Seattle, said he finds the destruction of the records after a short timeframe “mind-boggling.” He compared OSPI’s decision to the destruction of police misconduct records, which would hamper any effort to find patterns of civil rights violations.

“I can’t understand why any public agency would not retain records of its actual complaint decisions, especially when it pertains to civil rights complaints, which is what special education complaints are,” he said.

Advocacy groups for people with disabilities and government transparency are also protesting the decision, saying it could affect services for special education students across the state. In all, about 14% of Washington students – about 143,000 – qualify for special education.

OSPI didn’t respond to specific questions about the policy change, and said in a statement that the state archives “strongly recommends” disposing of public records after the minimum retention period is over to “ensure the efficient and effective management of state resources.”

As of now, records on the OSPI website only show the publication of decisions dating back to 2020, just five years ago – about 500 of decisions in all. OSPI said while the website only shows records dating back five years due to “technical space constraints,” the agency internally keeps records for up to six years. It’s unclear yet if older decisions have been permanently deleted.

Archived no longer

Special Education Community Complaint decisions can be filed with OSPI by anyone who suspects violations of state or federal special education law. An investigation must be completed within 60 days, allowing for a third party to resolve conflicts between a student and their school district.

The decisions are most often used by parents, teachers, school districts and lawyers to understand how past complaints were resolved, which can inform current complaints. They can also be used when developing a student’s individualized education program (IEP), a legally mandated plan for students with disabilities.

“Education advocacy for families who have students with disabilities can be tricky,” said Andrea Kadlec, an attorney for Disability Rights Washington, a nonprofit watchdog group for people with disabilities.

The complaint process is especially helpful for families who want to resolve disputes without hiring a lawyer, and it is faster than taking the issue to court, Kadlec noted.

Findings are published online after OSPI weighs both sides of the issue, which Kadlec said is crucial for understanding how the state has previously interpreted special education law.

The state has long struggled with fully funding special education services, and that underfunding has long been a cause of financial woes in school districts. Previously, the state mandated a limit on how much funding school districts could receive for special education services, regardless of how many students in the district needed access to those programs.

During the legislative session this year, state lawmakers from both sides of the aisle voted unanimously to eliminate the funding enrollment cap, and to increase funding statewide for special education services. Pollet called the move a “historic achievement.”

Gunter said she found out about the destruction of the records while trying to search for hearing decisions dating back to 1990 to see if one of the investigators on her case was involved with any prior complaints of violating state or federal law.

She then discovered through emails with staff at the state archives that the state had changed its retention policy in 2020, when schools statewide were locked down by the pandemic, at the request of OSPI.

In an email, OSPI spokesperson Katie Hannig said her agency follows the practice recommended by the Washington State Archives of deleting records at the end of the recommended minimum retention period. She said the complaints weren’t systematically archived until 2012.

Public records from OSPI show that the retention status of the complaints and other types of records, including civil rights compliance files, were changed in 2020 from archival – considered to have enduring value for historical or legal purposes – to non-archival, which are scheduled to be deleted after six years.

The archives, which is part of the Secretary of State’s office, advised OSPI to only archive records with “profound influence,” and as of 2024, OSPI only archives the decisions if they are of “statewide interest.”

Charlie Boisner, a spokesperson for the Secretary of State, said that the archives worked with OSPI in 2020 during a regular update of retention schedule, and the changes were approved by the state records committee.

Gunter eventually contacted the State Auditor’s Office to look into the issue, but the office declined to launch an audit.

Auditor spokesperson Kathleen Cooper said they have communicated clearly to Gunter that the issues she raised “are important but not as high a priority as other areas we’ve decided to audit.” Employees in the office have had regular communication with Gunter on a variety of issues, Cooper said.

The public needs to know

Stacy Dym, executive director for The Arc of Washington, which advocates for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, said the group is “extensively concerned” that OSPI does not maintain historical documentation of the records.

“I think the public needs to know what they say, and I think the families that have a vested interest in the results need to better understand what the decisions are,” Dym said.

The Washington Coalition for Open Government, a public records watchdog group, objected to the destruction practice in a March letter to the state archives, and argued for permanent retention of those documents.

Kathy George, an attorney who specializes in special education law and open government issues, told the state records manager in a letter that she relies heavily on a previously published 2017 decision to advocate for her clients, which is now unavailable on OSPI’s website. She has not heard back from the state records manager.

George, who has represented The Seattle Times in public records lawsuits, said that when she learned of the issue she submitted a request to OSPI for all decisions that are older than six years old in the hope of preserving them before they are permanently deleted.

Pollet also wrote to OSPI this month, asking for the agency’s reasoning for changing the retention practice, and to express the importance of the documents.

While OSPI received the ok to delete records after six years, records that are not available and indexed “may not be cited or relied upon under relevant state records law and due process,” Pollet wrote. Pollet said he had not yet heard back from the agency.

Gunter said she does not feel like the systemic issues at the heart of her complaints were resolved through the complaint process. She also argued that complaint decisions do indeed have enduring legal and historical value, and deserve to be maintained indefinitely. She wonders if the issue is happening at other state agencies.

“There’s no price tag on these records, but that doesn’t mean they’re not public resources that are of incredible value, not just now, but for posterity,” said Gunter.